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"Halt!" shouted Sir Robert; "we are past the half-way stone. Earl Ivo's and Earl Ralph's men are answerable now for the prisoner." "Treason!" shouted Ivo's men, and one would have struck Hereward through with his lance; but Winter was too quick for him, and bore him from his saddle; and then dragged Hereward out of the fight.
Then Duke Beltane, that had been the Hermit Ambrose, clasped his mailed hands and smiling wondrous glad and tender, yielded his soul to God. In a while Beltane came forth into the courtyard and beheld Sir Jocelyn mustering their knightly prisoners in the ward below, for, with Black Ivo's death, all resistance was ended.
But hereupon the lank fellow cried out, bold and querulous: "Take ye heed, for whoso dareth lay hand on me, toucheth the person of Duke Ivo's puissant self!" "Ha say ye so?" growled Roger, and forthwith squeezed him until he gasped again. "Loose me, knave!" he panted, "Duke Ivo's Steward, I Bailiff of the northern Marches with towns and villages adjacent thereunto "
Lords ha, messires, there is talk afoot of seizing the gates, of opening to this churchman and praying his intercession to Ivo's mercy to Ivo the Black, that knoweth nought of mercy. Alas, my lords, once they do ope the gates " "That can they in nowise do!" said Sir Benedict gently, but with face grim and hawk-like.
A running of swift feet and Walkyn sprang betwixt them, his face grimed with dust and sweat, his armour gone, his great axe all bloody in his hand: "Master!" he cried, "in Winisfarne lieth Pertolepe with over a thousand of his company, I judge and in the woods 'twixt here and Winisfarne is Hollo of Revelsthorne marching on us through the woods with full five thousand of Ivo's picked levies, new come from Barham Broom!"
"So now will I guide thee back to thine own fair duchy, gentle mistress, for I do tell thee here in Pentavalon shall be woeful days anon. Even as I came, with these two eyes did I behold the black ruin of Duke Ivo's goodly gallows a woeful sight!
Meantime Beltane, sitting his weary charger, glanced from Sir Pertolepe's deep array of knights and men-at-arms that thronged and jostled each other in the narrow forest-road to the distant flash and glitter of Duke Ivo's mighty van-ward, and from these again to the walls of Belsaye.
"My masters," quoth he, "ye have heard my words, how this night I go to take down Black Ivo's great gallows. Come ye with me? Aye or no?" "Aye, lord!" cried the three in one acclaim. "Do ye then stand with me henceforth 'gainst Black Ivo and all his might? Aye or no?" "Aye, lord!" cried they again. Then Beltane smiled and drew his sword and came to them, the great blade gleaming in his hand.
Up rose the dust, forward swept the battle as Black Ivo's hosts gave back before the might of Mortain; forward the blue banner reeled and staggered where fought Beltane fierce and untiring, his long shield hacked and dinted, his white plumes shorn away, while ever his hardy foresters smote and thrust on flank and rear.
"Mercy, good my Lord, in the name of God and all his saints!" Ivo went to ride on. "Mercy!" and he laid hands on Ivo's bridle. "If he took a few pike out of your mere, remember that the mere was his, and his father's before him; and do not send a sorely tempted soul out of the world for a paltry pike."
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